U.S. Sen. John N. Kennedy is freshly reelected to a new six-year term, and pondering a quick turnaround campaign for Louisiana governor in 2023.
Yet he still found time to take his political standup act on the road last week, as part of a doomed effort by GOP senators to carry profoundly unfit Georgia runoff candidate Herschel Walker over the finish line.
It was an undeniably friendly rally crowd in Loganville, where Kennedy was greeted by shouts of “we love you” from voters surely familiar with his countrified schtick from Fox News, and Kennedy responded that he thinks they’re “star-spangled awesome.”
He then launched into a predictable routine bashing the “high IQ stupid people” who run things in Washington, heavy on derogatory references to yoga mats and woke people who allegedly hate everyone from George Washington and Thomas Jefferson to Dr. Suess and Mr. Potato Head. But he saved the big punchline for a lowly, leafy green.
Posing the theory that all those “high IQ stupid people” carry around Ziploc bags full of kale, Kennedy responded: “I don’t eat kale. You know why? Because kale tastes to me like I’d rather be fat.”
OK, enough of that.
Kennedy is what he is and he does what he does, and it’s really not surprising that he’d be recognized in other states as the character he plays on TV.
Watching the clip, though, I couldn’t help but wonder how many of the Georgians at that Walker rally know that the real-life Kennedy is pretty darn high IQ himself, having earned degrees from Vanderbilt, the University of Virginia and Oxford, and that in the circles where he is at home, plenty of people try to eat healthy. I also wondered whether they have any idea that he was once a Democrat who backed John Kerry for president and can turn that hokey accent off as easily as he turns it on.
More interesting is what the Louisianans hoping Kennedy will throw his hat in the gubernatorial ring might be thinking.
Kennedy’s possible entry is essentially freezing the campaign to replace term-limited Gov. John Bel Edwards in place.
Attorney General Jeff Landry is off and running, following his own tried-and-true script as a divisive culture warrior. A few lesser-known figures are pondering the race, but there remains an opening to be the anybody-but-Landry standard bearer, a Republican who can maneuver through Louisiana’s tricky primary system to speak for voters of all parties who consider themselves part of a sensible, serious center.
A guy like Kennedy could fit the bill, the theory goes, based on his smarts and a long record as a government official, including as state treasurer. He’s got the name recognition and enough existing voter support to have won reelection last month without breaking a sweat or needing to spend all the money he could now put toward a governor race. Unlike fellow U.S. Sen. Bill Cassidy, who considered running but now says he won’t, Kennedy hasn’t alienated diehard Trumpists by breaking with the disgraced former president, which doesn’t exactly make him one of that other John Kennedy’s profiles in courage but should help him compete for Landry voters.
That’s why Lt. Gov. Billy Nungesser and current Treasurer John Schroder say they’ll only run if Kennedy doesn’t, and have given him until January, anyway, to show his hand.
Whether he’d actually start behaving more sensibly and seriously is an open question.
The voters who’d help Kennedy block Landry are likely to be more bookish than the AG’s base, or at least uncomfortable with Landry’s current censorship campaign aimed at public libraries. They’re likely to be more supportive of public health priorities than the backers of a guy who vehemently fought COVID-19 restrictions and Obamacare. So maybe mocking smart people and healthy eating isn’t the way to appeal to those folks.
That he could be their candidate anyway suggests they know perfectly well Kennedy’s act is a hoax, whereas Landry’s extreme priorities appear entirely genuine.
Could the “Vote for the fake, it’s important” bumper stickers be far behind?